David Cameron last night indicated British involvement in air strikes against jihadists in Syria and Iraq could begin within weeks.

As senior Tories said there was ‘overwhelming’ support for the UK to join military action, the Prime Minister spoke publicly for the first time about striking Islamist targets in Syria without President Assad’s consent.

He also signalled that British attacks on Islamic State forces, which have seized large swathes of Iraq, could come as soon as the country agrees a new government.

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David Cameron has hinted that attacks on Islamic State forces in Iraq and Syria could happen 'within weeks', but officials said President Obama made no specific requests for the UK to join the strikes

Its formation is expected on September 11 – the anniversary of the attacks on New York’s twin towers in 2001.

But in talks with the Prime Minister at the Nato summit in Newport, south Wales, officials said President Barack Obama made no specific request for the UK to join strikes.

The US has already launched limited action against IS forces in Iraq, but only to prevent advances that threaten minority communities, rather than to destroy the militants’ existing positions.

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Mr Cameron set a series of conditions for British involvement in more ambitious military strikes – saying there would need to be a request from a new, representative Iraqi government and that regional powers would have to take the lead. Asked about UK air strikes, the Prime Minister said: ‘I’m certainly not ruling anything out.

‘I think there’s something else as well as moral and legal justification … in the past sometimes people have seen western intervention as something that goes right over the heads of the local people … [and] of the regional powers and neighbours.’

He suggested Nato troops could train Iraqi and Kurdish forces to repel IS terrorists – perhaps in a neutral country such as Jordan. It emerged Britain has sent Lieutenant General Sir Simon Mayall, former deputy chief of the defence staff, to Urbil to advise Kurdish authorities on strategy for pushing back IS.

GOLD STAR FROM THE PRESIDENT

President Barack Obama was given a few tips about art yesterday as he visited a primary school in Wales.

He praised pupils’ drawings of the Welsh countryside as he and David Cameron visited Mount Pleasant Primary School in Newport, near the Nato summit headquarters at Celtic Manor Hotel. The two leaders sat in on a lesson about Nato during their 30 minutes at the school.

Mr Obama spoke his first words of Welsh, greeting the children with a confident ‘Bore da’ [Good morning]. Hundreds of excited parents and spectators, some of whom had arrived at 5am, stood on walls and rooftops to watch the President’s 22-car convoy arrive at 9.40am.

Pupils had to go through a metal detector as they arrived. Lisa Reynolds, whose ten-year-old son Adam met Mr Obama, said: ‘He normally comes home from school and says nothing much happened... so we will have to wait and see today.’

Welcome in the valleys: Mr Obama inspects a drawing by one of the pupils at Mount Pleasant Primary School in Newport, near the Nato summit headquarters at Celtic Manor Hotel

In Westminster, Conservative whips, who are in charge of party discipline, were gauging the degree of support among MPs for Britain joining military strikes.

They are understood to be anxious to avoid a repeat of the fiasco last year when the Government lost a Commons vote on proposed action in Syria.

Former attorney general Dominic Grieve suggested most of his Tory colleagues would back military action against IS, saying: ‘My colleagues … take the view that what’s happening in Iraq and Syria is a serious violation of human rights … and that in those circumstances action which can stop it would be justified. But I’m sure there’s also an understandable wariness … it’s got to be in circumstances that do not aggravate the situation.’

The Prime Minister spoke with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko during a working session at the Nato summit at Celtic Manor Hotel

As the Government’s former chief adviser on law, he said strikes against IS forces in Iraq and Syria would be legal. Commons Leader William Hague said the Government was not proposing military action ‘at the moment’, but said if it did, ministers would only seek advance Parliamentary approval if ‘there is time to do so’.

Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Nato secretary-general, said members had an ‘obligation’ to stop IS, adding: ‘I’m sure that if the Iraqi government were to forward a request for Nato assistance, that would be considered seriously by Nato allies.’

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said air strikes ‘would have to be part of a wider approach’, warning: ‘Air strikes on their own … don’t work.’

Tory MP John Baron, who opposed previous military action in Iraq and Libya, said: ‘Any action against IS must be at the invitation of the Iraqi government and be clearly defined. Past errors must not be repeated.’

PM blasts EU leaders for paying ransoms

European leaders have fuelled the hostage crisis and financed terror plots against the West by facilitating ransom payments, the Prime Minister suggested last night.

In a thinly veiled attack on France, Germany and Italy, David Cameron demanded other world leaders be ‘good to their word’ and honour an international deal blocking such payments to extremist groups.

He used a dinner at the Nato summit in Wales to make clear his anger at the apparent continuation of the practise despite an agreement to end them being made at the G8 summit in Northern Ireland last year.

Cameron shakes hands with German Chancellor Angela Merkel during talks as Nato Secretary General Anders Fog Rasmussen looks on

‘What matters is not your signature on a declaration but not letting money be paid to terrorist kidnappers because that money goes into arms, it goes into weapons, it goes into terror plots it goes into more kidnaps,’ Mr Cameron said. ‘It is utterly self defeating. It is worse than self defeating, it is actually a risk to us at home.

He said he was convinced the policy of not paying ransoms to terrorists is right, adding: ‘I’m in no doubt that those countries that have allowed ransoms to be paid, that has ended up with terrorist groups – including this terrorist group – having tens of millions of dollars that they can spend on kidnapping other hostages, on preparing terrorist plots, including against us here in the UK, and in buying arms and weapons to wreak havoc.

All Nato countries officially deny paying ransoms for hostages, but US and UK officials are in no doubt that several still facilitate payments and others ‘turn a blind eye’. Italy is thought to be the worst offender.

Prime Minister Cameron’s been very firm in sharing our view that it’s the wrong thing to do to pay ransom to an organisation like Isis

Ben Rhodes, US deputy national security

An Italian aid worker who was captured alongside Briton David Haines – who now being threatened with execution – was later freed by Islamic State. Federico Motka, 31, said he had been tortured and moved six times.

It has been disclosed that a total of six hostages have been released in recent months, and alleged that large ransoms were paid to secure their return.

Officials said Mr Cameron raised his concerns without singling out individual nations, but there was ‘no doubt’ who his remarks were aimed at. He was backed by US President Barack Obama, who shares his opposition to the payments. ‘Prime Minister Cameron’s been very firm in sharing our view that it’s the wrong thing to do to pay ransom to an organisation like Isis. It provides them with additional funding and incentivises more kidnappings,’ said Ben Rhodes, US deputy national security adviser.

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said ministers face a ‘terrible, moral dilemma’ over how to free hostages, but paying ransoms will only make the situation worse. He told LBC radio: ‘The judgement we have taken as a country is that once you start acceding to those demands you feed those demands. Ironically you put more individuals in peril later.’